June 6, 2007 | 1:47 pm

Tatooine tech comes to Israel

Posted by Adam Wills

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Two Technion students have figured out how to make moisture vaporators. Moisture vaporators, people! Can genetically engineered banthas be far behind?

The WatAir,

developed by Joseph Cory (Geotectura) and Eyal Malka (Malka Architects), is an inverted pyramid array of panels that collects dew from the air and turns it into fresh water in almost any climate. The project took first place in the Arup

Drawing Water Challenge, beating out 100 entries from North America, Europe, Africa and Asia.

Inspired by the dew-collecting properties of leaves, one 315 sq ft WatAir unit can extract at least 48 liters of fresh water from the air each day. Depending on the number of collectors used, an unlimited daily supply of water could be produced even in remote and polluted places.

More images available here.

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May 17, 2007 | 11:28 am

Geordi LaForge, eat your heart out

Posted by Adam Wills

The computer science department of Technion-Israel Institute of Technology has created a virtual-reality device that helps MS and Parkinson’s patients improve their ability to walk using visual and auditory feedback.
Researchers found that the patients displayed an improvement of nearly 13 percent while wearing the device, which includes a cell phone-sized audio component with a visual feedback apparatus (think Cyclops from X-Men).
The visual component presents users with a virtual, tile-floor image displayed on one eye. This allows the user to distinguish between the virtual floor and real obstacles, making it possible to navigate even rough terrain or stairs.
The integrated device—the first to respond to the patient’s motions rather than just providing fixed visual or auditory cues—is already in use at a number of medical centers in Israel and the United States.

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